Chapter 56: Outrageous
"Tiamat… has arrived!"
Still within the "sky" of Mesopotamia, that imaginary domain wedged between the inner world and the outer void, a presence lingered.
The Heavenly Realm, once woven from the authorities of the gods, was gone. Yet here, a single point of light still floated, burning with brilliant sunlight.
The Sun God Shamash stood upon his golden chariot.
With Rowe's help, this deity, who had fused with the judicial authority of the future, now possessed a foothold in Imaginary Number Space. Not because his raw power had grown, but because he had gained the authority of "legislation."
To legislate is to establish. To establish is to make a place real. To inscribe existence into a void that prefers nothingness.
And so, when the gods fell, Shamash remained.
Of course, not every Mesopotamian god had perished. There were still those who accepted retreat, who did not oppose Rowe and the others. Gods like Shamash's own father, the Moon God Nanna, and Nisaba, the all knowing goddess of writing and wisdom.
They had all stayed at this boundary, watching in silence, waiting for the true crisis.
Now that crisis had finally stepped into view.
Long ago, at the dawn of stellar formation, when the atmosphere was still chaos and the seas were molten memory, Tiamat, incarnation of the Sea of Chaos, had been betrayed and exiled into the deepest reaches of the Imaginary Number Space.
Now she returned.
"We cannot stop Mother Goddess…" Shamash lowered his gaze. Even before closing the distance, he felt her. That vast, ancient pressure that did not belong to any age shaped by gods or men.
He had already decided what to do.
Hold her back for a while.
If he could not hold her, then run.
A tactical retreat, as that sage liked to call it. Shamash found the term suspiciously convenient, but he would borrow the wisdom anyway.
Still, before acting, he sent a final warning toward the human world.
"At this moment, the only one who can truly deal with Mother Goddess Tiamat is likely Sage Rowe. He is the manifestation of Ea's authority, older than the primordials, and the Sword of Rupture itself."
…
Mesopotamian Plain.
Uruk.
Rowe stood before the curse left by dying gods.
The azure sky was drowned in that chaos. Black as wet earth, malignant as a starving tide, the mire hung down like stalactites of hatred, now only a step away from his hand.
No one breathed.
Enkidu, Ishtar, even Ereshkigal deep in the Underworld, all lifted their eyes as if sensing a chill that did not belong to this world.
"Rowe." Gilgamesh strode over after hauling himself up from his fall. His crimson eyes carried a serpent's cold glare. "You should know the price of deceiving this King."
You said you would live.
"AHAHAHA hahaha…"
Rowe laughed.
"You, Gilgamesh, can also be so hesitant?"
"A wild dog really cannot stop barking…"
"Gil is still so foul mouthed."
Rowe sneered, then softened just a fraction.
"Relax. I would not lie about something like that."
He lifted his hand and pointed at the dark flow in front of him.
His chest was full of emotion. Full of exhilaration.
Emotion for what he had paid. For what he had survived. Exhilaration because the goal he had chased through blood and madness was finally within reach.
Palm forward. Fingers spread.
The rolling malevolence found its target and seemed to sense him at once.
Slurp.
It vanished.
The tide of black mire recoiled as if yanked by an invisible cord, shooting back into the sky like fabric being reeled away. It fled desperately toward the slowly closing rift, trying to crawl back into Imaginary Number Space.
Rowe blinked.
"?"
What is wrong with you? Or… what is wrong with me?
He was still processing the absurdity when a voice descended from beyond the world.
"Sage Rowe. I am the Sun God Shamash, and I have something to tell you."
Rowe nearly choked.
You might as well say you are Shaffrin.
But he held his tongue and listened.
"You know what the gods have always guarded against. The primordial Mother Goddess whom they betrayed and exiled."
"She is returning, and her purpose is to destroy the existing world and return everything to its original state."
"And now…"
"Tiamat… she is here."
"We cannot hold her off for long. You must be prepared."
The voice faded.
The aura of Shamash on the far side of the world thinned quickly, as if swallowed by something too vast to name.
Rowe stared upward.
The gods' resentment was visibly shrinking, curling back on itself, retreating into the void.
Because that curse was resentment before death, it carried the gods' consciousness like poison in mud.
What the gods feared, it also feared.
And nothing frightened the gods more than Tiamat.
Rowe turned his gaze to the distance.
The sky was still blue. The mountains and seas still stood clean and sharp.
Tiamat was coming. But if Shamash could delay her even a little, then they still had time.
Shamash had already stepped into the upper tier of divine existence by integrating future authority. The gap between "upper tier" and "primordial" was still an abyss, but it was no longer the kind you fall into and never return from.
Rowe narrowed his eyes at the fading black mire overhead.
"To be disgraceful while alive is bad enough. Even the resentment you leave behind after dying is this cowardly."
He did not bother to hide the contempt in his voice.
Would a dead "person" still be afraid?
This was outrageous.
He inhaled slowly and looked around.
Gilgamesh, Enkidu, Ishtar, all of them wore the same baffled expression at the curse's retreat. Yet no one spoke.
Because they had chosen to believe him.
Because they had placed the weight of the world on his shoulders.
If the mountain would not come, he would go to the mountain.
If the gods' curse would not descend, he would drag it down himself.
Rowe stretched out his hand.
A faint light flared in his palm. The shadow of the Key of Heaven flowed like a current.
A door opened, linking to where the curse had curled above.
Black mud poured out in a torrent.
Surging straight toward him.
No matter what, this curse had to be borne by someone. Rowe would not abandon the opportunity he had spent his life carving into existence.
What happened after… could be dealt with after.
He closed his eyes slightly, letting the mire swallow him, then sink into his body.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
His heart beat with a heavy, contained rhythm.
A sensation beyond language rose instantly.
Mountains. Seas. Countless layers of the world seemed to press into his chest.
The whole present world felt as if it were sliding into his consciousness, dragging him backward toward something older than history.
He was drifting toward the primordial.
A purer death, one that would not even pass through the Underworld, was approaching.
Rowe opened his eyes.
"Cough, cough…"
He coughed twice, then looked at the faces watching him with tightly clenched nerves.
Gilgamesh. Enkidu. Ishtar Rin.
He chuckled.
"I barely managed to suppress it."
He did not die.
That was expected.
The gods' curse was terrifying, but it was not enough to kill the Sword of Rupture instantly.
Still, Rowe understood what that meant.
Right now, his life had already started counting down.
Ea's authority was immense, but he was not Ea himself. He could not shield Rowe perfectly forever.
To hover at the edge of death without falling in.
To still breathe, and yet be doomed all the same.
In Ziusudra's words…
Rowe had personally forged the end of his own destiny.
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